Last week (9-13th November) should have seen world leaders coming together to act on the climate crisis at the COP26 Summit in Glasgow.  

Instead, thousands of students from around the UK united online for the Youth Climate Summit, a week of climate learning, discovery and action. The Summit culminated in 5 ‘ Youth Climate Calls’ which Youth Ambassadors will take forward to businesses and government.  

From seashore safaris, to eco raves, to Green Operas, the Youth Climate Summit saw 163 free online sessions from 90 supporting organisations including WWF, Greenpeace, the Marine Conservation Society, Oxford University, Imperial College, Tesco and Lego.

This took place over five themed days virtually hosted by primary and secondary schools from around the UK.  

The Summit was hosted on the Transform Our World teacher resource hub, coordinated by environmental charity Global Action Plan. The Youth Climate Summit aimed to empower teachers to respond to youth anxiety about the climate crisis and turn student concern and passion into positive action.  

The Let’s Go Zero campaign launched during the Youth Climate Summit, was a call to action throughout the week for schools to pledge their commitment to be zero carbon by 2030.  

After a session from Britain’s Got Talent stars SOS From The Kids Choir, the week ended in a Closing Finale on Friday 13th November. An expert panel including UK High Level Climate Champion Nigel Topping, Lego’s Head of Environmental Responsibility Tim Brooks and campaigner and social media influencer Mya Rose- Craig aka Birdgirl discussed the climate calls, which were then put to audience vote.  

Following on from the Summit, our Youth Ambassadors are presenting the winning calls at a series of events, asking businesses and government to act. 

The Youth Climate Calls are: 

1)       Set up specialist protection areas for all carbon sinks such as peatlands, forests etc. with a fund that businesses impacting these areas pay into   

 2)      All new schools to be carbon zero, government and business to help all existing schools achieve carbon zero by 2030

3)      Stop subsidising farming that harms the planet and instead subsidise good farming practices such as regenerative farming and polycultures 

4)      Business and government to accelerate the circular economy 

5)      Government and business to make good on the green recovery they keep talking about - starting now, especially with green jobs 

Don't forget: 88 hours of free online climate action content for teachers was created at the Youth Climate Summit – teachers can sign up now to join Transform Our World for free and access the videos.